Different opinions

Personally, I’ve been fortunate enough to have made friends with many different and varying backgrounds, ethnicity, sexual orientation, political opinions, takes on religion and much more; and I wish that mix was even bigger. Because I learn so much from them and their perspectives and view on things, I’d like to believe both I and them get a richer way to think about the world.

I don’t necessarily agree with them in some cases, but I always respect their right to that opinion and the possibility for us to discuss it. And I naturally believe all of them deserve the same rights to their values and legal rights in their lives. Therefore, Brendan’s choice of what propositions and political parties to support do not match my personal choices and I’m sad when any restrictions affect only one group of people. But at the same time, in a democracy, people must be able to support and express their values. And hopefully, in the best of worlds, that leads to a good discussion and greater understanding.

Possible actions and opinions

When all this came out about Brendan’s lack of support for gay people having the right to get married, maybe it would have been easier if he had immediately apologized about how his actions might have hurt people, and made their lives harder. Without giving up his political values, but publicly showing more empathy towards people affected, and to have a constructive discussion about values. But, for integrity reasons or others, he never wanted to have a public discussion about his values, and that’s his choice.

In hindsight, though, it’s always easy to be wise, to think alternative approaches would have solved it all. Given the current state, the outcome seems like it was inevitable. Now Brendan has left Mozilla and has also decided to not be on Twitter anymore either. (Update: he is now back on Twitter)

Reading the tons of articles, tweets and much more surrounding this issue, though, one thing that worries me is the notion of a mob rule. The criticism hasn’t often been very nuanced, a lot of cries for “Resign” and lack of will to discuss the greater picture and the complicated topic this is. It has more seemed like an “of course you can have any opinion you want, as long as it’s the same as mine”-approach.

Yes, Brendan might have a political opinion that not you, nor I, want to support. But at the same time, and I think it needs to be pointed and remembered, with Mozilla he has created one of the most open and diverse organizations I know of, defending the rights of all users out there. There is literally all kinds of people and backgrounds both within the Mozilla organization and community, and the users across the world that Mozilla works for to help and protect.

And the argument that just because he became the CEO, he would change the organization and people in it to all become anti-gay is just ridiculous. He co-founded Mozilla 16 years ago, been on the board of the Mozilla Foundation and has constantly worked to make the web open and inclusive to everyone. There is no reason that would change, nor that people would just accept such a possible change.

Without Mozilla, I’m certain that the web, and the rights of users, would look very different. We need to respect that enormous work that was put in to make that happen and make sure that the torch is being carried on.

What about Mozilla?

Mozilla is filled with people working really hard to make sure the web stays open, that it is available for everyone and to protect users’ rights and their integrity.

These recent events have hurt us, and we could point fingers forever, shifting blame. But I’d rather see us move forward, both as an organization and with the help of you out there, to keep on making the web and the world better.

We are here, and we will continue to be, for as long as we can. Because we truly and genuinely believe it’s the best thing for all of us.

57 Comments

People have been basing the guy for expressing his own views on the basis that it does not fit with their own beliefs or the social norm. I have seen the word bigot float around several times and should any of these people be reading this I have a few pointed reminders for you.

What is deemed morally and socially acceptable changes with time and you have absolutely no right to beat others over the head with a stick to enforce your own beliefs. If you believe holosexuals should be permitted to marry, that’s great but it doesn’t mean you get to slap others over the head if they believe otherwise. Let me cite an example to show you why basing such things on personal or socially moral basis is flawed.

Since we’re on the topic of marriage. Let us take polygamy as an example. I am sure that most people here will say that it is unacceptable for one person to marry more than one partner and would vote against it should such a proposition ever come around. Would not the people who believe in favour of it then deem you to be bigots? Since when does your view by being the “social norm” suppress their own views?

Now let us then the tables. Suddenly people against it find themselves in the minority. Should they then be hounded out of their jobs by the “social majority” who feel that by siding against polygamy they should be bashed over the head with the “social norm” stick? I think not. That is EXACTLY what you people have done to the person who had done nothing but express his (legally permissible) view. One day you may find yourselves on the other side of the social stick, though I hope none of you go through what I suspect Brendan currently is.

You have the right to your opinions and so does he. You do not have the right to use your own views or the “public norm” to suppress that and to those people comparing him to Nazi’s and such things. Get down off your high horse and compare like for like instead of trying to cite extreme cases for added effect. You’re not impressing anyone and you’re simply making yourself look foolish.

Welcome to the world of morality, it’s a lot more pliable than people want to think.

One of those that actively infringes on the rights of another by preventing interaction at best and downright confinement at worst. Segregation and marriage have nothing in common. Why? you can be not married but can still exist in exactly the same manor as if you were – just with one less piece of legal paperwork. Segregation involves the physical separation of two (or more groups).

If you’re going to compare, please do compare like for like concepts. I will happy engage in such debates.

The point isn’t the specifics, it’s the attitude. Anyone is free to express any belief they want, but that doesn’t mean they can’t be held socially responsible for those beliefs. David Duke may have a right to campaign for “recognizing White Culture” or whatever they’re calling it now, but that would make him a poor choice to be the public face of a major company. Not that I’m equating Eich with Duke in terms of badness of their beliefs.

To be clear, you’d be okay with a company that names as its CEO a person who has materially supported anti-miscegenation laws? That’s your prerogative, of course. I don’t share that attitude.

In truth, I wouldn’t use Mozilla products more or less with Eich in charge. I think it’s probably true that he wouldn’t make the company an anti-LGBT institution. That being said, his support of Prop 8 is disgusting, and I’m glad that Mozilla no longer has anything to do with him.

Very well then. If it is about attitude then are you against polygamy? Are you willing to face social exile for it? Somehow I don’t think so and yet that is pretty much what has been forced on him. He resigned yes, did he have much choice in the matter due to outside pressure? Not really.

The attitude you are expressing is no better than what you are accusing others of supplying. I’m sure there are plenty of people who would find your views on many things prerogative and disgusting. You’re entitled to them none the less and I have little interest in beating you over the head with the morality stick to justify my beliefs that you are wrong.

Yes, the specifics very much matter. Just as with anything the specifics define reasonable comparisons from unreasonable ones. Your comparisons are wholly unreasonable.

Here is an interesting point for you. I have so far discussed this topic without mentioning my own views on if I agree with his choices or not. Why? It doesn’t make a difference if I support his views or if I don’t. At very least I can say I am cable of looking at the events with some measure of neutrality. I don’t need to cite extreme cases to try and validate my points and I am certainly not going to try victimising people who believe otherwise.

I’m just going to tag a thought on the end, because conversation is healthier than hate.

For starters, I think drawing an argument by comparing polygamy to homosexuality and gay marriage is completely irrelevant because whilst polygamy is a belief, it is not a way in which we are born, it’s nurture, not nature.

My issue with people making moves against things like gay marriage is that we are denying someone the right to live life equally because of the way they were born, and in that way this is something more comparable to racial segregation.

I am not dismissing the validity of your points to free speech, however, I think that whilst free speech is integral to society, we cannot condone free speech that is hateful, or at least I can’t.

I think that hate is fear of the unknown, but I think that in today’s society that if you hate someone for their nature (and not their nurture) then you’re comparable to someone who starts smoking today – with all of the information available to you – you just have to know that it’s stupid, and if you choose to ignore that, then you should be prepared for the stigma that will follow you.

I’m not sure whether I will be able to associate Mozilla with love anymore, after recent events it is more likely that I will associate Mozilla with hate from the LGBT community and their supporters (for everybody who do not share their views).

The open web and progress for browsers no longer seems the mission “core values(!)” of Mozilla (and this saddens me).

I can only speak for myself and what I’ve heard from other people at Mozilla, but trust me, the one thing that does hold everyone together at Mozilla is the will to do good for the web and for peoples’ rights.

Unfortunately the right of at least one person is not respected – and this is also true for all those people who do not share the opinion of the LGBT community related to a subject like marriage…

When, and only when, Mozilla will show in the future that the open web -and only the open web- is paramount, then there is a possibility that I’m able to promote Mozilla (and its products) again the way I did in the past.

Differences on other subjects must be accepted and when there are issues with a certain person, please discuss it in private next time before making a fuss over it. (This last comment is directed to the people who caused the uproar of course, as they are the reason why we lost a brilliant man in our fight for an open web).

I can’t comment on how it all got started, and to be honest, I don’t really know. And it has been far from optimal how this has played out. All I can say is that we will do our best to do good and to focus on the web and users.

What amazes me are the comments that this outcome is a win for the LGBTQ community. That may be the case if PR is your only concern. But looking at what Mozilla has meant for the open web (and Brendan for Mozilla) and what the open web means for the emancipation of underprivileged communities I think it may even be the opposite.

I really can’t fathom how Brendan Eich can align his inclusive Mozilla mission with his divisive (religious?) views internally, but that’s for him to deal with.
For political reasons he probably was not the right person to be CEO as PR is a part of that. But his departure from Mozilla is still a big loss for the open web.

I hope he’s doing well and that he will find another way to make the web a better place. I also hope he will change his mind about opening up marriage for same sex couples.

I don’t think he needed to resign – if he’d admitted he was wrong, apologised quickly and perhaps made a donation of $1000 to a LGBTQ rights supporting charity all would have been ok.

But since he utterly failed to do that resignation ended up being the only sensible option because someone with even mildly homophobic views is clearly a bad fit for Mozilla’s mission of inclusiveness.

“if he’d admitted he was wrong” – he might be wrong according to your opinions, but is he wrong when a group of people disagree with his opinion?

Also the mission of Mozilla is to promote the open web, nothing more and nothing less – dragging all kinds of other issues into it is hurting Mozilla and a number of Mozilla supporter which not necessarily share the opinion of the LGBT community.

To clarify my comment above: potentially an apology to people who have been hurt by his stance would have helped. For me, I don’t want to label anything as wrong or right here, they are different options from different people.

Kees, there’s not even a mention of Prop 8 or gay marriage never mind an apology, or an expression of a change of heart on the issue. Without that comments such as “express my sorrow at having caused pain” come across as insincere.

He appears to be stating that he wont let his opinions get in the way at Mozilla – fine words, but they don’t really get to the heart of the matter.

@kees well, this is the crux of the issue isn’t it? I take it as self evident that not allowing member of the LGBTQ community to marry the person they love is treating them different from everybody else – in other words discriminating against them. That to me seems a very logical statement.

If you’re arguing it’s only an ‘opinion’ that it’s discrimination, well, it’s pointless discussing it further.

If you’re saying that you or Mr Eich have an opinion or value system that says its ok to discriminate against the LGBTQ community that’s different.

For me it follows on logically from an acceptance of basic human rights in a democratic society.

Also I’m a straight white middle aged married male with three kids. Please realise it’s not just “the opinion of the LGBT community”.

You might think that the LGBT issue is about human rights, but 52% of the Voters in California disagree with you. To me it is an opinion and to you it is about human rights, most likely we will not agree on this (so it is pointless to continue this discussion). Als please have a look what others have said about this issue, while disagreeing with the LGBT point of view.

Mozilla should have focussed on its core mission, and indicated that this is the only mission of Mozilla, like I said before “Also the mission of Mozilla is to promote the open web, nothing more and nothing less…”.

The way the mission of Mozilla is hijacked by groups for there own purpose (whether it is about human rights or not) disgusts me, and I hope that the Mozilla Organisation will be able to return to its roots – so that we will get an open web not only on the desktop, but also on the smart phone.

(To all those who think that their rights are worth fighting for, but are not related to the open web: Please start your own organisation or join one which fights for your cause, whether it is a justified one or not. But leave Mozilla out of it as this is not were our common ground is).

All I can say in response to your statistic is thank fuck I don’t live in California. 52% of voters are hateful humans with opinions that prevent other humans living happily with societal rights and not being punished for how they were born. I’d love to know why people feel they have the right to deprive others of something that doesn’t affect them at all. What does gay marriage being put into law do to you?

Does it suddenly mean that your life has changed or does it merely mean that other well to do humans are now able to love with the same rights as those around them.

But yes you’re right, there is no point continuing this conversation as you’re clearly blind to reason and care nothing as to how your opinion and vote is harming the happiness of others.

It’s come down to this, I never thought it would, but I have for the first time, withheld my name because of fear of reprisals. Robert knows who I am. I have been following Robert’s posts since before he created DOMAssistant. I’ve enjoyed the nature of his posts which earlier were very personal and been helped by his technical posts.

I want to thank you Robert, for your well reasoned and sane post. It’s sad to me that in this day of supposed tolerance and free speech that we are no longer allowed to have differing opinions. Especially religious opinions. Brandon Eich has never shown intolerance in his his hiring practices nor whom he promotes in all the years he has worked for Mozilla. Yet because he believes differently, some believe that he must be punished for thought crime. Never mind that he has never shown intolerance to others, his actions are not good enough. He must be forced to think like those who oppose his belief. I believe that Mr. Eich is a bigger person than who forced him out of the CEO position at Mozilla.

At a previous job I worked with a homosexual man whose talent I respected and with whom I had a good working relationship. However when he found out from someone else that I am a Christian and that I go to a large church that supported proposition 8, he not only refused to work with me, but also demanded that I be fired despite never having shown intolerance or bigotry towards him. His homosexuality nor my belief had simply never come up before, but my actions weren’t good enough, I also had to have the “right thoughts”.

Because of employment laws that protect employees with religious beliefs in California, they could not fire me, but they made it very difficult to work there. There were no problems with the quality of my work, which was always above expectations, the problem was my thoughts. I had to be punished for thought crime.

I liked what Scott Johnson has said about this travesty, this witch hunt against Mr. Eich.

George Orwell gave us a look at the operation of a totalitarian one-party state in 1984. This week Mozilla gave us a look at its nascent liberal variant. Recently appointed CEO Brandon Eich was officially made a nonperson. He was dispatched down the memory hole as the company announced that he has “step[ped] down from his role as CEO” as a result of his contribution of $1,000 to the passage of California’s Prop 8 six years ago.

This is what the liberal variant of Newspeak sounds like:

Mozilla believes both in equality and freedom of speech. Equality is necessary for meaningful speech. And you need free speech to fight for equality. Figuring out how to stand for both at the same time can be hard.

We have employees with a wide diversity of views. Our culture of openness extends to encouraging staff and community to share their beliefs and opinions in public. This is meant to distinguish Mozilla from most organizations and hold us to a higher standard. But this time we failed to listen, to engage, and to be guided by our community.

Now that Mozilla has listened, engaged and been guided by its community, Mr. Eich has been found guilty of thought crime (or “thoughtcrime,” as Orwell had it) and right deviationism. He has been dispatched down the memory hole in the name of “diversity” and “inclusiveness” in a corporate statement that lacked only the necessary smiley face.

You must be kidding. So you’re upset because you were made to feel bad because of what you think? How do you think homosexual people feel when you tell them, by voting for proposition 8, that you don’t think that they are equal because of how they were born, and in turn how they think? How do you think they felt 20 years ago when they had to suffer anonymity whenever they expressed their true opinions for fear of reprisals?

I think you’re now realising how every persecuted group feels because you’re suddenly in that group. The difference is the persecutors have become the persecuted.

So you support religious bigotry. Anyone who disagrees with you deserves to be fired from their job, is that it? Are you like one young homosexual coworker of mine who believed that anyone who didn’t believe as he did, deserves to die?

Having grown up in the south in the 1960s, being part black and Jewish on my mothers side and having a Roman Catholic dad is knowing persecution and I’m not suddenly in that group, I’ve always been in that group. Having people want to kill you and being beat within an inch of my life because of my race is persecution. Someone saying “I believe marriage is between one man and one woman” is not persecution, it’s disagreement. They have neither tried to kill you nor beat you for being in favor of same sex marriage.

You keep saying that word. I do think you know the meaning of that word.

This statement makes no sense whatsoever and is utterly and completely ridiculous.

1) The fact that Brendan Eich at one point in his life actively went out of his way to reduce the rights for one group of people is FAR WORSE than the fact that a “mob” wanted him gone for this very thing.

2) Yeah, sure, everyone has an opinion. But when gay teens are killing themselves because of the body of oppression that Brendan Eich actively contributed to, there’s nothing that says we have to give him the opportunity for a peaceful discussion over wanting him gone.

3) If you wanted to discuss this rather than being rolled over by the “mob,” then why didn’t Brendan Eich actively engage in a discussion with the community about this? Why no explanations? Why no communication? If a CEO is scrutinized, then he has every opportunity to wash himself of false accusations by simply meeting them head-on, but instead Brendan chose to silently step down, and that kind of says more about him than the supposed scary “mob” that wanted him gone.

Again, this statement is awful, makes no sense, and seems more apologetic of someone who opposed (and supposedly still opposes) gay rights than it is supportive of equal values.

In addition, believing that Brendans critics identify with the following sentiment:

“And the argument that just because he became the CEO, he would change the organization and people in it to all become anti-gay is just ridiculous. ”

Is just plain ridiculous as well. The problem isn’t that him becoming the CEO will magically transform Mozilla. It’s the fact that Mozilla was represented by someone who’s actions don’t align with the values of the organizations.

For the same reasons that people with prejudice are immediately terminated from jury duty, so too should a CEO be terminated if he or she actively opposes the core values of s/his organizations.

Brendan created and represented Mozilla for 16 years, without a trace of treating anyone unequal, but instead creating an Internet with openness and possibilities for everyone. To me, that stance and those actions wouldn’t change just because he got another title.

Just because you can’t visually spot any negligence or tangible bias it doesn’t mean that it’s not there. Any person in a position of influence will always make decisions based on personal preference, and guidelines will only be there to act as regulations.

No person can ever be the embodiment of a set of principles that they personally oppose. Do you honestly believe that a human being automatically sheds himself of all personal bias once he steps into his work role, and puts it back on when he gets home?

A CEO will always represent an organization with personal bias, no matter how much he may try to shed himself of all that is his personality, identity and history.

If the public doesn’t want a community-driven organization that supports equality to be spearheaded by an individual who has actively opposed equal rights for all human beings on a personal level, then what good argument could there possibly be against their wishes?

What I do believe is that most workplaces, if not all of them, have people with very different and varying opinions, on all kinds of levels. Just like society. And that we need to engage in discussions, work and talk with people who have different beliefs than ourselves, in a respectful manner. To breed greater understanding and hopefully make progress together.

Telling them that they’re wrong, that they’re not accepted or welcome is most likely not something that will change their minds.

For someone who values discussion so much, you don’t seem willing to address any of the actual criticisms with a logical argument and instead take to repeating high-flying and empty mantras about openness and discussions.

Here, I can do it as well:

“All I know is that we’re different individuals on this planet with different hopes and opinions, and that we need to encourage equality, protect those who are discriminated against, in order to breed a safer society and hopefully make progress together.”

See how little it means when you’re just throwing empty buzzwords around?

Fact of the matter is that you can believe anything you want, but when you go out of your way to deny a certain group of people the same rights as everybody else, why should we give that person the courtesy of being discussed with?

With logic, there is also a good number of LGBT people at Mozilla who have argued in blog posts that Brendan has done nothing but to make them feel included. Feel free to read those, talk to them, see what their takes are like.

I do appreciate the discussion, and I feel that both you, I and others have expressed our opinions on the matter here.

I understand that it’s not an official statement of the Mozilla Corporation, but it is a statement nonetheless, and I think it’s a bad one.

I have thus far only been able to find one single statement made by Brendan on this topic, and it was one that celebrated the values of the Mozilla Corporation while offering no commentary whatsoever on his actions, beyond the fact that he’s resigning. If there’s any additional commentary made by Brendan on this, then I’d love to see it.

I’ve also read the entirety of the “For the Record”-post, and it merely lists the events as we know them while being overly apologetic of Brendan’s situation, without sympathizing one bit with the fact that Brendan has contributed to oppressive values that directly harm a lot of people.

Welcome to the mob. There is nothing, absolutely nothing you can do to appease them other than join them. Anything less than joining them is wrong in their eyes. You are not allowed to point out any good someone did if that person does not agree with the mob because they are evil and can do no good and MUST be punished if they disagree with the mob.

That’s why AwfulMozilla wrote that the church I go to is a “bigoted church”. The same church that took care of people with Aids when it first came out and there was a lot of fear about Aids. Some doctors wouldn’t even touch Aids patients because of fear of catching Aids. That’s why the intolerant AwfulMozilla calls me bigoted when my wife and I rented a house to a gay couple when one had Aids. When after 10 years they got too sick to maintain the house, we gave them $2,500 (at the time a large sum of money) and two months free rent and helped them move into a smaller place. We ended up fixing up the house and moving into it because we aren’t afraid of Aids. But the intolerant AwfulMozilla believes I’m the bigoted one because I believe in the traditional definition of marriage.

AwfulMozilla, you don’t know what bigotry is until you’re part black and Jewish in a southern neighborhood in the 1960s when someone doesn’t just disagree with your lifestyle but wants to kill you because of your race. Tolerance is not a one way street, it goes both ways. A tolerant person can disagree with me and not want me to loose my life (literally) or my means of making a living by depriving me of a job.

So Robert, there is nothing you can say or do that will not be considered evil by the mob, unless you join the mob.

Oh Robert, I forgot. Many of the arguments used by the mob are simply not true or “straw man” arguments. Everything the mob says should be fact checked. I know it’s hard to do which is why like in the movie War Games, most of the time I simply refuse to play. You made a fair and reasoned post I believe thinking that we should all just get along and you’ve been hammered for your post and rational comments. The problem is that the mob is not rational. If you don’t believe and act as they do, according to them, you are not just wrong, but evil.

It took me a while to realize that and it makes me feel sad. The rare times I argue with the mob is not to convince the mob, because the mob cannot be convinced. It’s to tell rational people that there is another side and that while they may disagree with the other side, the other side is not evil.

I suggest that you don’t engage the mob, because if you don’t join them, they will want to harm you like they did with Brandon Eich. It doesn’t matter that you believe in same sex marriage, you stood up for a man who believes in traditional marriage, therefore you tolerate evil.

They will not want anything less than a public apology, and a statement from you stating that Brandon Eich is evil. I’m sorry because you’re a good man and don’t deserve that.

It was a mistake for them to let the creator of Javascript go. Maybe they should have kept him as CTO and not bring the topic up. Maybe they should have handled the promotion better in terms of PR. But now they lost Brendan, who will definitely be snapped up by Mozilla’s competition. Mozilla can only lose.